Benedict Cumberbatch played the part of Alan Turing in the film The Imitation Game recently. Turing cracked the German “Enigma” code and is considered a hero of World War II.
According to The Independent, last February, the real-life family of Alan Turing visited Downing Street to demand that the British government pardon 49,000 men who – like Turing – were prosecuted for being homosexual.
In England, homosexuality was illegal until it was decriminalized in 1967, states the BBC.
The Independent states that Turing’s great-nephew, Nevil Hunt, great-niece, Rachel Barnes, and her son, Thomas, handed over the petition – which had almost half-a-million signatures – and demanded a new law on the matter be approved.
Ms. Barnes, 52, from Taunton, said: “I consider it to be fair and just that everybody who was convicted under the Gross Indecency Law is given a pardon. It is illogical that my great uncle has been the only one to be pardoned when so many were convicted of the same crime.”
Turing, the cryptanalyst and mathematician, was convicted in 1952 for “gross indecency” with a 19-year-old man.
As part of his sentence, he was chemically castrated and he died in 1954 after apparently committing suicide.
He was exonerated in 2013, but his family and petitioners want the government to pardon all the men convicted under the outdated law.
“Generations of gay and bisexual men were forced to live their lives in a state of terror,” said the editor of Attitude Magizine, Matthew Todd.
How does the British government feel about it?
A law on the topic has not yet been enacted, but that would probably change after the British Parliamentary Elections coming up on May 7th.
In March, the Leader of the Labor Party, Ed Miliband, said that a future Labour government would pave the way for posthumous pardons for gay men convicted under historical ‘gross indecency’ laws, according to the BBC. It would allow the families of those men convicted to apply to have their records expunged.
Legislation would be known as “Turing’s Law” in memory of Alan Turing, said Miliband.
Miliband’s decision may have also had an effect on The Conservative (Tory) Party. Recently, during April, The Conservatives pledged to introduce a new law helping to “lift the blight of outdated convictions” from other people found guilty of similar offenses, states The Telegraph.
“Thousands of British men still suffer from similar historic charges, even though they would be completely innocent of any crime today,” the Tory manifesto read.
The manifesto reads: “Many others are dead and cannot correct this injustice themselves through the legal process we have introduced while in government. So we will introduce a new law that will pardon those people, and right these wrong.”
Sources state that the Scottish National Party (SNP) could change the outcome of the election in the U.K., depending on whether a coalition is formed between the SNP and one of the larger parties, like The Labour Party or The Conservative Party.
Piers Morgan, writing for The Daily Mail:
“…(N)either of the two main parties has a hope in hell of winning an overall majority at the general election.”
So one of the bigger parties will need to form a “coalition” with a smaller party to form a working majority to rule the country. The SNP is supposedly the most powerful small party.
The problem is that the SNP wants independence for Scotland. So a party that forms a coalition with the SNP will be working with a party that wants to break away from the U.K.
“So they will have to take a begging bowl to one of the smaller parties to do a deal that allows them to form a ‘coalition’ government. The biggest ‘smaller’ party will almost certainly be the SNP, who should end up with 40-50 seats in Parliament, having pretty much wiped out the socialist Labour party in that country, which used to be considered its heartland,” writes Piers Morgan.
The Labour Party’s leader, Ed Miliband, has accused David Cameron (Conservative) of “demeaning his office” and putting the UK’s future at risk as a fight over the SNP’s future role intensifies, according to the BBC.
Miliband said Mr. Cameron, who has warned of the dangers of a Labour-SNP coalition, should be “taking on the nationalists” not “talking them up,” states the BBC. He suggested other Conservatives were “ashamed” of their election strategy.
However, Labour has said the Conservatives were “talking up” the threat of the SNP for their own political interests.
But former Prime Minister Sir John Major said the SNP could “blackmail” a future Labour government.
The Conservatives have continued their warnings about the SNP’s likely influence on a minority Labour government in the event of a hung Parliament, with the former Conservative leader claiming it would be a “recipe for mayhem”.
The SNP has said it does not want to form a coalition with the Conservatives, but is interested in one with Labour.
Conservative David Cameron has stated that a Conservative government would honor Scottish devolution (granting Scotland more autonomy), but he wants to “ensure the rest of the UK will not ‘lose out.'”
Below is a BBC interview with the head of the SNP, Nicola Sturgeon.
Jay Hart of the British semi-pro soccer team Clitheroe was cut from the team after video of him and the fan you see was made public. They were having sex in the opposing team’s dugout after a match, writes the publication Screamer.
The match in question was a 4-1 Clitheroe loss to team Mossley. Coincidentally, Mossley had advertised the game as “ladies day” in appreciation of their female fans, according to Screamer and The Daily Mirror.
While the two were going at it, someone nearby secretly began recording the encounter. Afterward, the video was shared online and caught the attention of Hart’s football club, which swiftly made the decision to get rid of the player.
The Mirror:
“Striker Jay Hart can be heard laughing on the mobile phone footage as he was caught still in his club T-shirt…”
The Mirror continues:
“The face of the fan cannot be seen. Within hours of the footage being circulated to team-mates and fans, Hart was sacked by the club, who play in Evo-Stik Division 1 North.”
Club chairwoman Anne Barker said that Hart had brought the club into disrepute. She said “Any players, while wearing a Clitheroe tracksuit, represents the club.”
“We expect a certain level of behavior and discipline. And that wasn’t it.”
To his credit, Hart – of Accrington, Lancashire – apologized for the incident and said he was “full of regret.”
The video appears to have been scrubbed from the internet. However, there is still an image on twitter.
The story isn’t all fun, though. Hart’s girlfriend slammed whoever was responsible for posting the video clip, according to The Daily Mirror.
She took to the Clitheroe Football Club Facebook page to vent her frustration at those who had made light of the incident.
She wrote: “Have a bit of decency for the people it’s affected. Thank god my kids are too young to read.”
In England, the soccer team – er, football team – Chelsea moved to within two wins of reclaiming the Premier League title after player Eden Hazard’s goal gave them a narrow victory over Manchester United at Stamford Bridge stadium in Fulham, England.
Victory in the coming games at Arsenal and Leicester City will return the title to Stamford Bridge for the first time since 2010.
London’s Chelsea were pushed all the way by a resurgent Manchester United, looking toward a seventh successive victory.
Manchester United player Wayne Rooney and the recalled Radamel Falcao came closest for Man. U., but once again they fell victim to the resilience and defensive strength that is Chelsea’s trademark under manager Jose Mourinho, assisted by the brilliance of Hazard, states the BBC.
The BBC looks at what life is probably like for 3 British girls who are thought to have gone to join Islamic State in Syria. Many probably have no idea about what life is really like with the Islamic State group.
Reaction to news that the Church have criticized Brand over supposedly encouraging voter apathy and also attacked the current British political culture.
Last year, during exceptionally low tides at Tyrella Beach in Northern Ireland, a team from the University of Bristol, England, used advanced geophysical techniques to search for the spot where the SS Great Britain was grounded in 1846.
Designed by engineer Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the SS Great Britain had been built of iron with a screw propeller for trans-Atlantic voyages and was the longest passenger steamship in the world at the time, according to the publication Archaeology.
On the ship’s fifth voyage to New York, a navigational error resulted in the grounding in Northern Ireland at Dundrum Bay, close to Newcastle, Co. Down.
Recently, New Jersey governor Chris Christie made comments about vaccinations while on a trip to England.
“Mary Pat and I have had our children vaccinated and we think that it’s an important part of being sure we protect their health and the public health,” Christie told reporters in England Monday. The likely Republican presidential candidate added: “I also understand that parents need to have some measure of choice in things as well, so that’s the balance that the government has to decide.”
The comments came after a laboratory tour at MedImmune, a biologics company that makes vaccines in Cambridge. Christie is on a three-day tour of Britain designed to promote trade with New Jersey businesses and round out his foreign policy resume ahead of a likely 2016 run for the White House.
While important, it is the view of the website OK, Fine that vaccine-gate is not as important for Christie as the investigations into purposely causing a multi-day traffic jam in the town of a mayor he didn’t like, misuse of Hurricane Sandy relief aid, and improper use of bondholders’ funds by the Port Authority.
According to the Times-Herald News, it was a position he’s taken on vaccines before, but one that drew a new level of attention amid a U.S. measles outbreak and his recent moves toward running for president.
The political significance of Christie’s remarks was amplified by his office a short time later, when it released a statement saying the governor believes “with a disease like measles there is no question kids should be vaccinated.”
Christie’s stumble into the vaccine issue came as a measles outbreak centered in California has sickened more than 100 people in several states and Mexico, putting a new spotlight on parents who choose not to vaccinate their children.
Some do so for religious or philosophical reasons, while others cite a concern that vaccines can lead to autism and developmental disorders — a link debunked by rigorous medical research.
A village in the U.K. has angered the Jewish community after agreeing to reinstate a sign saying “Hitler’s Walk.”
The sign for a park overlooking Mevagissey village was taken down by the now-defunct Restormel Council in 2005 after complaints that it was inappropriate.
Now Mevagissey Parish Council has ordered a new sign for the park. They say that that is what local people call the park, according to the BBC.
Harvey Kurzfield, of Kehillat Kernow, which represents the Jewish community of Cornwall, said the sign was “outrageous”.
The park, on a sloping area a little smaller than a soccer field at the top of an place called Polkirt Hill, was named in the 1930s after a dictatorial local councilor, who was nicknamed “Hitler.”
According to The Daily Mail and express.co.uk, someone called Father Christmas was laid to rest in a churchyard in the village of Dedham, Essex, on May 30, 1564.
An entry in the parish record for that month, reads: “The 30th Day, Father Christmas was buried.”
A spokesperson for Essex Records Office confirmed it was no joke and that careful research had uncovered a whole host of Christmas family members living in Essex.
Christmas was not an uncommon surname in the area around that time, according to the spokesperson.
“It appears with some frequency in north Essex and south Suffolk and by 1881 the name was still largely concentrated in the south east of England,” he said.
He also said, “The title ‘father’ is most likely the usage given in The Oxford English Dictionary as ‘a respectful title given to an old and venerable man.'”
OK, Fine. 